


265°

by SandrC



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Candy based gore, Canonical Child Abuse, Gen, Its minor but its Liam, ep9 spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:21:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24662218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandrC/pseuds/SandrC
Summary: The melting point of liquorice candy.
Relationships: Liam Wilhelmina Jawbreaker & Jet Rocks & Ruby Rocks
Comments: 18
Kudos: 60





	265°

**Author's Note:**

> I said I would, Jay.
> 
> I have many thoughts about this episode but mostly that I spent the latter quarter smiling widely because something in me is inherently broken. Whaddup. I'm the Regis of Angst.
> 
> (I think it's the depression tbh)

He's seven and a half when Joren puts a blade in his hand and nods at the mint chocolate fox in the trap. "Go ahead," he commands. Liam — not sure what's being asked of him, confused at the implications — looks up at his father and frowns. Joren ducks his head again, sharp, impassive. "The fox. You need to kill it."

"Why?" His voice wavers. He is soft — _a wuss,_ his brothers say as they play Stairs and he cries, fingers crushed under their boots — and he doesn't get it. _What has the fox done? What would killing it achieve?_

"If it gets free, it'll just suffer. It's in pain. Kill it." Joren is brusque. This is the most he's ever talked to Liam and, while the young boy likes the attention, a deep panic grips him. When Liam doesn't move, the Duke Jawbreaker kneels down, takes his smaller hand in his own, and draws the blade across the fox's throat. A warm spurt of lifeblood drips through his fingers and he stares as the animal kicks once, twice, then falls limp in the spring trap.

His vision swims, tears turning his chocolate-stained fingers into an impressionist painting. His throat catches, a lump forming and closing off his airway. Behind a whining pitch in his ears, he can hear a soft keening noise coming from his own mouth. His world is a bubble of animal and blood and him.

Behind him, Joren clucks, disappointed. "Buck up, kid, it's just an animal."

It is almost a decade later and, again, he is reminded that he hates being so close to death. He much prefers to put a peppermint bolt in someone's head at a dozen places rather than a knife in someone's throat at none. It's so much easier to distance yourself if there's distance.

He hates death with all his being.

 _Especially_ because it's not an animal caught in a trap this time — one that will become food or clothing or candles or all three — but a _person_. A friend. _Family_.

Beneath his soft grip, dripping globs of black liquorice slither gently between his fingers and fall to the floor with sickening noises. The smell of anise coats the back of his throat. His hands are warm and shake so hard he's _certain_ Jet will open her eyes and yell at him to _stop_. He keeps expecting her to.

She _won't_ though. He feels her last breath leave her. Sees her spirit in that extra-dimensional space he made with the magic he wielded. Hears her last request.

" _Tell her I love her. Tell her she did the right thing_."

And he, shocked silent, acquiesces.

When everything is said and done — the battle over with, the furor flushed from their bodies leaving behind only exhaustion — he finds tears beyond his reach, even as he leads the Rocks family to where he stashed Jet's body. Even as he watches them grieve.

His clothes smell of anise and are tacky and warm. The black stains underneath his fingernails and the taste in his mouth won't leave. The feeling of anguish that Ruby draws on so readily — howling and weeping with everything she has — a million miles above him as he sets in the hollow in his own chest.

He scrubs his hands until they're raw. The darkness won't go away. The smell lingers on.

Out, _out_ damn spot!

And all his mouth can say is "sorry _sorry **sorry.**_ "

"She said she loves you." He says when he can. She is catatonic. Quiet. A million miles away. "She said you did the right thing."

She does not speak but turns and grabs his hand with her own.

As Ruby — Joren — presses a locket — knife — into his hands, Liam cannot say any word but " _why?_ "

" _Because_ ," she whispers in twinspeak — a language that he was taught because they accepted him, a language of love and siblings and mischief — " _you **understand**_."

He doesn't ask her to elaborate.

His dreams are filled with animals and traps and slit throats like morbid smiles grinning grim spectres against a forest of pinks and greens. He wakes to find the locket around his neck warm and pulsing like a heartbeat and Ruby, unconscious — having fought sleep with all of her — clutching hers tight.

He thinks of warm gobbets of candy between his fingers. He cleans his hands until they bleed. Every time he breathes he apologizes but every time he closes his eyes he sees darkness and water knives and black on black on black. His pack smells of anise and peppermint. His chest is a shallow grave.

He wonders if this is a _fraction_ of what King Amethar went through.

He's always hated death.


End file.
